So why is this beast master my favorite of the mages we have to date? Wounded prey, lair pooping out dire wolves is amazing. They don't have the greatest life total, but they allow you to roll incredibly high dice totals, when combined with the bow, and the crowd favorite hurl boulder, with the meta moving away from teleport, tangle vine is a beautiful thing. Enfeeble is also incredibly punishing, and even some protection in the form of a guarding bear, the world becomes your oyster.
She, contrary to her fast trait, actually plays a lot like a wizard. I have actually played around with the fairy familiar, which seems on the face to be pushing things in terms of action advantage, can actually help a lot with the longer matchups.
What makes the bow so good? Because it is an incredible threat to the enemy mage. U have to deal with it, or stay out of the way. Sure, you can get into the same zone, but I've got this, like, bear, that guards.
What it comes done to, is that this mage does not play itself. It's not an easy book to build, or play. And while I at this about most mages, having a preset game plan is vital to a winning game. How mine plays is by using action advantage over the course of the game to then burst kill in the last few rounds. Maybe not the best with the current structure, but incredibly strong in an umtimed match.